the beach house.

My Papou has a house in Newport Beach.  It's beautiful, right on the boardwalk, and has the BEST water-pressure in the showers!!  We've been coming her for summer vacations for a very long time.  And it really is the best way to visit the beach.  Right now, I'm lying in bed with the windows open just enough to feel the ocean breeze and hear the waves.  There's also a seagull out there, not too peaceful, but at least he can't get in here to peck at my blankets looking for food!  

This is Ruthe's first official trip to the beach.  So far she's loved it!!  But we haven't put her in the sand yet... 

She has, taken a nap in the California sun:

Done some people-watching with the Old Man at the boardwalk:

Hit-up the mall for some California "souvenirs" (also known as toys and clothes):

Gone out to dinner in the harbor (boats not pictured):

Our plan is to take her down to the water later today... let's hope she loves it!!

Mother's Day, with a baby.

Last year I was miserably pregnant for Mother's Day.  And I had to speak in church.  Did I mention I was fat and pregnant?!  I think all moms who are prego for Mother's Day should get a do-over after the baby's born.  It's only fair.

Anyway, this year was much more fun!!  It might have had a lot to do with the sweet, smiling baby that woke me up, or possibly that her dad changed her diaper.  Either way, I fully enjoyed having my little family all together!!

All of the other pictures we took for Mother's Day are on a "real" camera, so I'll have to add them in later.

My mom's parents were in town on Saturday, because my awesome aunt planned a whole weekend trip for them!  So we got to have dinner with them on Saturday.  Ruthe loves when we spend time with lot so family because she pretty much never gets put down.  I just love that she has so many people to love her (and entertain her so I can eat!!)

Then on Sunday, we got up and ready and headed to church.  John LOVES taking the baby to church.  It's the cutest thing.  The worst part of the day was that John had to head back to Utah because school started that Monday.  So when we got home from church we took a few quick family pictures and then he packed up and headed out.  

For dinner on Sunday we went out with my Papou.  I tried to make a reservation at Brio, but the only time they had available for 6 people was at 8pm... That's our bedtime!!  So instead I just called at about 2:30 to put our name on the waiting list (it was two and an half hours long!)  That was definitely the way to go, because when we checked-in a little before 5 our table was ready in ten minutes!  

Overall it was a great first Mother's Day!  Now I just have to figure out what to do for John on Father's Day...

remember that time it was Easter?

this post has been sitting in my draft folder for a month!!  sorry!!

Happy Easter!!

This year was so much fun!  [and also a little sad because John had to stay in Utah.]  But little miss Ruthe Clementine sure had a great introduction to the wonderful world of marshmallow PEEPS!!

[and she LOVED them!]

That was Ruthe's treat, instead of a cupcake, for her nine month birthday.  I don't think she missed the cupcake very much, but she did have a little more trouble grabbing onto the peeps... the plastic tray and sugar sparkles make those Peeps some slippery little guys!

As always, my family spent Saturday at the Valley of Fire.  It's a 55-year strong tradition, and honestly, it doesn't really feel like Easter if we have to miss it.  We always go to the same place, at the same time, and do the same things.  It's perfect!!  Several years ago we started having an egg decorating contest and it has been getting steadily more and more competitive.  It's also nice to have something else to do since I'm too old for the egg hunt and Ruthe's not old enough! 

We had gotten a little pop-up shade tent for Ruthe, to keep her out of the sun, but the weather was so beautiful and there was plenty of shade by the picnic tables so we put it away and just let her hang out with everybody!

Unfortunately, none of our submissions for the egg contest won.  My mom and I are convinced that the voting pool of random-passers-by is rigged!!  

After the Valley-o-Fire, we headed home and took some hilarious pictures of the baby...

I was a little disappointed that she wasn't more upset about being buried in plastic eggs.  We did this to my little cousin like twelve years ago, and he was so mad about it!!  I don't think we even have one shot of Ruthe so much as frowning!  

On Easter Sunday we got up and got dressed and went to church.  Ruthe's dress was soooo adorable!!  There has got to be another reason for her to wear it... Anybody wanna throw a bunny-themed party?!

Ok, that's pretty much all I can remember from Easter.  I REALLY need to get back into the habit of blogging regularly!  But Ruthe just woke up, so you'll have to wait around for the rest of April, our trip to Laguna, and Mother's Day!!

my little hobbit.

Ruthe's gastroenterologist (GI doctor, for her g-tube) recently changed the way we feed her.  Ok, so I might possibly have been feeding her less than she's supposed to be getting - but she stopped spitting up after every meal, so I figured it evened itself out.  The whole story is long and boring and involves a lot of math, but basically after I weaned her off the pump she lost the equivalent of one feeding.  So her GI doc said that we need to get another full-volume feeding into her schedule.  That means waking up extra early for me, and a whole new round of spit up for the baby.

I used to feed her about 175 mLs every four hours - at 9am, 1pm, 5pm, and 9pm.  It took about an hour to feed her (on a good day) but she was doing really well and tolerating all the force-feeding really well.  The thing about having a baby who's been tube-fed for her entire life is that she really has no idea what it means, or feels like, to be hungry.

Since her visit to the doctor last week I've been trying to squeeze another feeding into Ruthe's day.  It's not really that hard, but it's altered our schedule quite dramatically.  Especially the waking up part...  this is what her schedule looks like now:

7am -- breakfast + meds
11am -- second breakfast
3pm -- lunch
7pm -- dinner + meds
11pm -- elevensies

Because I think her doctor is training her to become a hobbit, and eat seven times a day.

utah, again.

I am a really bad blogger.  

I have good intentions, I swear!!  But it seems as though every time I sit down to write a post about what we've been up to, Ruthe decides it's a good time to spit up/cry/poop/need to eat... you get it.

Anyway, let's maybe just recap with pictures, okay?  Because I'm pretty sure that's all anyone really wants to see.

We went to Utah to spend a week with John at the end of March/beginning of April.  It was a lot of fun!!  Ruthe still had a funky cough, and I was a little sick the first couple of days, but it's just nice to be together as a family, so we toughed it out. :)

While we were there I tried to get a little more decorating done, and organize the tiny space a little better.  John and I are starting to realize that we really spoiled ourselves with our apartment in Idaho... you never realize how much of a blessing a second bedroom is until it's been turned into the nursery and you have to share closet space with a stockpile of diapers.  BUT how cute is the baby's room looking?!

I just LOVE those gold dot stickers!!  I did this wall, and I'm going to do the wall to the left with the closet doors.  I'm hoping I'll hate the closet doors less if they're fancied-up a little.  We still need to look into better lighting.  That's a $12 lamp, and the little shade things are always falling off.  It's just so bizarre to me that there aren't any ceiling lights in the bedrooms.

While I was there I got to meet up with my roommate Brittney!!  My roomies are some of my favorite people, but we all live so far away now that college is over. :(  So, if anyone would like to donate to the next Roomie Reunion, we'll accept all major credit cards and/or frequent flier miles!!  (because as much as we love you, Mikey and Meg, we are NOT driving to Alaska or Chicago. sorry!)

John also convinced me to buy a new couch while we were there.  He's been complaining about our couch since he moved there in August, and it was a little big for the space... I don't have a picture of the actual couch, but I did snap this cute shot while we were shopping!!

Those cheeks... they're irresistible.

Ruthe and I had to occupy the rest of our days with trips to Target and Netflix movies while John was at school.  We also took a lot of naps...

My mom and Teri came up to spend the weekend and drive home with me and the baby, and we had a lot of fun shopping and eating and playing with Ruthe!  By far, the best part of the weekend was going to The King's English Bookshop in SLC and meeting the author of some of the cutest baby books in the universe!!  

Ruthe now has the entire collection AND five of them are signed!!  Jennifer Adams was so sweet, and told us about two new books coming soon!  We can't wait to add them to Ruthe's library!

As wonderful as it is to spend time in Utah, our first priority is Ruthe's health, so we had to head home for a week full of appointments. :(

Luckily everything is still going well with her heart!  Her cough is finally fading away, and she's growing, so we're hoping to make it through April before her next surgery.  We do kind of need it to be done soon, so she can be cleared by cardiology to have her cleft palate repair done before she turns one.  If we have to wait too much longer than that Ruthe could struggle with even more speech and/or eating delays.  So keep your fingers crossed we get into surgery in early May! (that sounds awful, to be hoping for surgery... my, how our world has changed!!)

more ketchup.

Oh, March, how did you get away from me??

Sorry about that last post... I had made up some little notes that I hoped would jog my memory when I finally sat down to write all about John's trip home for spring break, but it didn't work.  I really need to get back in the habit of blogging as things happen. 

This girl is getting SO BIG!!  Let's not discuss the fact that she's already eight months old, and just focus on her deliciously chubby cheeks.

(Ignore the slobber, please.  She's like a fountain of gross sometimes.)

Her cheeks are the best.  They're smushy and pink and jiggle when the stroller goes over a bump.  Sometimes I steer her over bumpy ground for a lot longer than necessary because it's just so cute to see her cheeks jiggling.  The downside of those beautiful cheekies is all the slobber she can store in them.  Seriously, you don't wanna be around when we have to break out the bulb-syringe... 

It's not only her cheeks that are wonderfully chunky... she's got some pretty serious thigh-rolls, too!!

And homegirl is totally loving this warm weather that means she can go pantsless!!  She likes the freedom it gives her to get her foot all the way in her mouth while she's strapped into the carseat.

She LOVES her feet.  I haven't gotten a really good picture or video of it yet, but her new favorite thing to do is cry and whine until I've brought her all the toys she owns, and then start chomping on her foot and babbling to herself about how hilarious she is.  I really don't know why we buy her toys... she would be fine with a paper towel and her feet (one sock on, one sock off - preferably).

I love celebrating holidays with thig girl.  We were all a little funky-sick on St. Patrick's Day, and never left the house, but this was her SUPER cute outfit...

She wore that for her dad the Friday before, and the she wore this while we all lazied around the house on Monday...

And just to even things out, she wore green polka dots and her big St. Patrick's Day bow to the doctor on Tuesday.  She had to get two shots, one in each leg, for the flu/RSV.  Usually there are two nurses that do the shots at the same time, but this time she had to do one, stick on a bandaid, then do the other one, and stick on another bandaid.  Ruthe is not a fan of doing it that way.

In the past couple of weeks she's gone from 16lbs. 9oz. to a full SEVENTEEN pounds!!  Most of her doctors keep track of her weight in kilograms, which is super annoying, but they generally do the math for me right after.  If they don't, I look it up on my phone really fast so I know how much heavier 7.55 is than 7.1, or whatever it was the last time.  Sometimes if the nurses aren't looking I hit the button to switch it over instead, but not all the scales calculate the ounces for you, some just give you a decimal point which is almost worse!!  Can you tell that I hate math??

Anyway, we've seen her cardiologist at least twice since the last time I really posted anything on here.  He is great!!  We love Dr. Rollins!  He says that everything looks just how they all expect it to look at this stage.

Her stent is narrowing, because she's growing and it's stretching out, so her pressures will probably start to build up, or drop, or do whatever they do in that situation.  (You can tell I pay VERY close attention.)  That means her next surgery will be happening pretty soon... in the next month or two.  Dr. Rollins really wants to get past flu season before we take her back into the hospital.

Oh! And look!

WE HAVE A THUMB-SUCKER!!  Haha.  She really doesn't do this very often, but I just love it when she does!  

With the cleft palate, and being fed by g-tube, there are a lot of concerns that Ruthe will develop sensory issues with food.  But so far, she is doing fabulous!!  I realize that she doesn't look very happy in this next picture, but she really does like these MumMum crackers.  She still hasn't figured out  swallowing, but as long as she doesn't get too big of a chunk in her mouth, the little pieces will just disintegrate.  Or she sticks them out on her tongue and I have to retrieve them - depends on her mood.

Right now, and I mean that literally, right this second, as I'm holding Ruthe in one arm and typing with my other hand, she's got a a gnarly cough.  So far she doesn't have any other symptoms, so I'm just calling it croup.  She is on some breathing treatments, and I have some regular cough-syrup-type medicine on standby.  I kind if giggle when I think about giving her cough medicine through her g-tube because in my non-medical opinion, the best and most effective part of cough syrup is that it coats your sore, sick throat in its thick-but-burning-goodness.  G-tubes don't offer that option.

She is much more interested in what the nebulizer does now...  At least, if you interpret "interested" as "wants to lick everything".

Just look at that sad little pout!  She really hates being sick, but she sure is a trooper and suffered through an afternoon of shopping for some summery outfits.  We found the CUTEST swimsuit for her.  It's maybe the fourth one...

There are plenty more adorable and interesting things I could post tonight... but my hand is starting to cramp from all the typing and scrolling and binky-adjusting.

So I'll leave you with this last picture of Ruthe, playing withe one of her favorite things.

(This was earlier today, and it's the first time she's really torn the paper all apart like that.  Ugh, everything she does is just so disgustingly cute!!)

#orrfamilyspringbreak2014

Sat - John came home!!  Family snuggles.

Ruthe really was excited to see her dad... she just hates when I interrupt her daily activities with the camera.

This was the sweetest thing... except there wasn't any room left for me to snuggle :(

Sun - church. Dinner w/ gramma & Hunter

My dad went to the NASCAR race, and brought Ruthe home a new bib... It says "Spit Crew" and she definitely lived up to the job!!

Mon - trip to Town Square, smog check

Monday was just boring errands, and shopping for some grown-up clothes for John.  But we spotted (and tasted!) this adorable dress at The Gap for Ruthe for Easter...

Tues - day date at Nacho Daddy, RUTHE'S EIGHT MONTH BDAY

John and I are suckers for a photo-booth!  The nachos weren't too bad either.

I can't believe this girl is already EIGHT MONTHS OLD!!  How did that happen??

Wed - errands, shopping at Target & Gap (Easter dress!), Walmart, cupcake!

Ruthe and I had some time to kill in Boca Park, so we wandered through Target, and then hit up a different Gap store to buy that purple dress.  And it's a good thing we waited!! They were having their friends&family sale so I got it for 40% off!!

After shopping and running more errands we let Ruthe try another cupcake smash... she's always cute, but I think she's the cutest with her face covered in frosting!!

Thurs - endocrinology, breakfast, snuggles, CJ park day

Ruthe had an appointment early in the morning, which is mean of the Endo-clinic to only have early times available :(  But this girl LOVES to be naked and play around on crinkly paper!!

Fri - feeding specialist, basketball game for John's b-day

John was going to miss seeing Ruthe in her St. Patrick's Day outfit, so we celebrated a little early, and showed off her fancy leggings to the new speech/feeding therapist.

After a short debate, and a promise of an arena-junk-food dinner, John and I convinced each other that we should go to the UNLV and SDSU game.  Not that we have any real affiliations with the schools, but just because we're from both of the cities and he loves basketball.

Sat - goodbye.

John had some studying and cleaning he needed to get done before school started again on Monday, so he packed up and left on Saturday morning.  That is the worst part of this whole long-distance-family thing.  Someday (hopefully sometime in the summer!) we'll get to live together more permanently, and that will be AWESOME!!